1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to image forming apparatuses such as a printer, a copying machine, and the like. More particularly, it relates to an image forming apparatus which develops an electrostatic latent image formed on an image bearing member with use of developer containing toners and carriers to form an image.
2. Description of the Related Art
Conventionally, image forming apparatuses such as a printer, a facsimile machine, a copying machine, and the like provided with a developing device which uses two-component developer containing toners and carriers to develop an electrostatic latent image formed on a surface of a photoconductive drum perform image forming by forming a toner image from an electrostatic latent image with use of toner supplied from a cartridge mounted to an apparatus main body and transferring the toner image onto a sheet. When toner in the cartridge runs out, the cartridge is replaced with a new cartridge by a user, so that toner is replenished into the image forming apparatus.
In this case, no problem arises if the newly replaced cartridge is a genuine product of a manufacturer of the image forming apparatus or a product which is qualified by the manufacturer (hereinafter, all of those are referred to as “qualified product”). However, a cartridge which is other than a qualified product (non-qualified product) is used in some cases. If a cartridge which is other than a qualified product is used, an ability of an image forming apparatus is not sufficiently brought out, and it may cause a failure in an image forming apparatus.
Further, as another conventional technology, a management of a cartridge with use of an RFID technology (Radio Frequency Identification) has been adopted in many image forming apparatuses developed in recent years. In this case, a wireless tag which stores information associated with a cartridge and toner as tag information is mounted to the cartridge. After the cartridge is mounted, a communication circuit provided in a main body of the image forming apparatus reads the tag information, so that it can be identified whether the mounted cartridge is a qualified product. In a case where a qualified cartridge is not mounted, a use history thereof is stored in a memory provided in the image forming apparatus. When a failure occurs in the image forming apparatus, a serviceman reads the history, so that the reason for the failure can be analyzed (Japanese Patent Unexamined Publication No. 2005-140800).